Page 20 of Bewitchingly Hers (Witches of Pleasant Grove #3)
Damien cleared his throat. “Zain and I were actually talking about that last night. Because we always knew there were small communities of witches—it was why I came here, after all.” He looked over at Willow, running his fingers through her brown hair.
“If I hadn’t been looking for Luna, I never would have found my mate.
” Everyone let out a soft aww as he pulled her tight, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.
It was the craziest story—and yet, so romantic how they’d found each other in a bizarre twist of fate.
It reminded me a little of how Barrett had come into my life, actually—Damien had been stuck in cat form, cursed by a witch from outside Pleasant Grove—and Willow had adopted him from the cat shelter.
She’d certainly had the surprise of her life when he’d revealed he was actually a demon, asked her to help break his curse.
Much like I’d been shocked to wake up in bed next to the redheaded man who was stuck to my side.
Not that I was complaining. I liked the companionship.
I liked coming home to him in my house. He spent his days searching for clues—both in wolf form, and around town as a human—while I worked at the coffee shop, keeping everything running smoothly.
And since I’d noticed he seemed more at ease when I wasn’t working the front counter, I tended to spend most of my time in my office these days, working on my administrative work.
Payroll, ordering and schedules took up most of my time, anyway.
And it was what I enjoyed, what I really felt like I was good at.
Sure, I didn’t mind being in the front as a barista, but I’d forever be grateful for the Clarke sisters for the promotion to manager.
The last two nights, I’d come home to him cooking us dinner, and my heart had almost burst at how easy this felt. How… domestic.
I liked it too much. And that was a problem.
Barrett squeezed my shoulder, and I looked back at him, into those eyes that I’d stared at for all those days when I’d been nursing him back to health in wolf form, and my racing pulse calmed instantly.
Like he knew just what I needed.
It felt like there was some unspoken connection between us that I couldn’t describe.
The girls at the other end of the table were sorting through the ancient boxes that Rina and Wendy had pulled out of their attics at the behest of their grandparents, who didn’t know our true purpose in our investigation. If they had, I was pretty sure they wouldn’t have been helping us.
Instead, they thought we were working on a project for preserving the town’s history.
For now, it was better to keep it that way.
“This seems like a pretty standard spell,” Cait was saying to Wendy, flipping through the old grimoire.
She was our resident expert on spells and hexes, along with being Willow and Luna’s cousin.
“It’s close to what the elders perform each month on the full moon to revive the magic.
But there’s something… missing.” She frowned, running her fingers along the page.
“Something different. I don’t know how to describe it, other than that it feels old. ”
“There is?” I perked up, tugging at the hem of my dark green dress as I walked over to her.
She nodded, pointing at the margins. “It looks like something’s written here, but it’s been hidden with magic.”
I leaned in closer, almost able to make out an iridescent shimmer of writing. That wasn’t uncommon with old spell books—hiding family secrets inside, covering up dark magic that shouldn’t be used anymore. But with this, it felt strange.
Wendy frowned, adjusting her headband. “Why would someone do that?”
“To cover up whatever they did,” Rina said, bending over to look at the book. “Obviously.”
“What do you think we need to reveal it?” Willow asked.
“ Please , please, please tell me we don’t need blood.” Wendy’s skin paled. She’d never liked the sight of it, which I knew troubled her particularly when she had recently departed spirits appear in front of her. Definitely not fun.
Cait furrowed her brow. “No. But I’ve read in old times, they used ink that would dry clear and only appear when exposed to fire, and I think that…
Maybe…” She grabbed a candle from the center of the table, the wick flickering to life, and she ran it across the surface of the page, careful not to spill wax or burn the thick paper and it’s magical text.
All of our grimoires were infused with magic, and while they were resistant to all the elements, you could never be too careful.
Shimmering gold text appeared on the page—notes from witches of the past, hidden for centuries.
“Wow.” A shiver ran down my spine. “This is…” Old magic. It was incredible.
“Anyone else have goosebumps?” Rina held out her arm. “I feel like we’ve uncovered something that we were never meant to know.” We probably weren’t. I could just imagine our elders rolling in their graves as we uncovered the secrets they tried to hide.
Everyone quieted as Cait studied the words in the margins, and then flipped to the next page and repeated the process again.
Finally, Wendy asked, “Well?” We were all dying with anticipation.
“I’d have to see if Agatha left any notes behind,” Cait said. “Then I can truly figure out the why. But I might have an idea of the how. And if I’m right, on the eve of the next full moon, we should be able to break it.”
“But we don’t want to destroy the wards, right?” I frowned, looking back at Barrett. “We just need to fix them.”
Cait shook her head, twirling a long strand of bright orange hair between her fingers.
“No. Whatever’s been done—especially if your wolf is right, and it’s been tampered with—needs to be undone.
” I blushed at the implication that he was my wolf, but I couldn’t deny how much I liked it, too.
“But maybe it’s time to stop hiding from the rest of the paranormal world.
The thirteen of us here are the strongest witches in Pleasant Grove.
We can create a new barrier. A better one.
” She looked up at Barrett. “If he’s right, then there might be beings out there that are our soulmates, our other halves. We owe it to all of us to find out.”
My heart leapt in my chest. After seeing Willow and Luna so happy with their mates, it was hard not to imagine what it would be like to find mine.
But then my eyes connected with Barrett’s, and I felt my stomach drop. I liked him. A lot. It was getting harder to deny that. What would happen if he found his mate, and then I had to say goodbye? I hated even thinking it.
Trying to shake the thought away, I turned back to the conversation.
“But the full moon is only a few days away. Can we even get everything ready by then? Breaking the wards will require a lot of precise magic,” Willow said.
Damien crossed his arms over his chest, giving her a look that said, over my dead body.
“…And I’m not exactly sure I can participate in this condition.
” She waved a hand to her growing belly.
I could only imagine how much strain it was on your body to grow a child, let alone to use that much magic as well.
And she was seven months along now, with an adorable little waddle and a bump that couldn’t be hidden.
“I’m sure we can find someone to fill in for you,” Cait said, closing the grimoire and turning her attention to me. Or, rather… the man behind me.
“Why is she looking at me?” He mumbled in my ear, and I looked back at him.
Cait nodded to herself. “Yeah. You’ll do. Maybe even better than one of us.”
Barrett shoved his hands in his pockets.
“Well… We were always taught that witches gave us our wolves,” he shared with all of them.
He’d told me this before, and I still thought the idea was incredible.
“That they unlocked this ability within us. I don’t have magic like you all do, but I’ll do whatever I can to help.
In a way, we’re all linked. Whatever the reason your ancestors had for sealing the town off, I suspect it was much bigger than just humans persecuting witches. ”
“You think whatever is attacking the wards now was after us back then?”
My wolf man just shrugged. “It’s plausible, though I doubt it.
If it’s been living nearby, feeding off the magic of the wards…
We would have known sooner if it had been here for centuries.
” He looked between all of us. “The barriers between worlds are growing thinner. I think this one isn’t from ours at all. ”
A shiver ran down my spine. Death, he’d said once. Gods, I didn’t even want to think like that.
“Do you know of a creature that can do that?” Willow asked. “Feed off of magic?”
His eyes met mine. “Only one.” The words were ominous, and I hated the way a trickle of fear ran down my spine.
That didn’t sound good. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.
“I’ve been going through every bestiary I can find in town and…
” The room quieted as the candles flickered more intensely, the smell of the sage we were burning filling the room.
He shook his head. “It’s not good. I’m going to keep looking, though. I hope I’m wrong.”
I breathed deep, trying to push the negative thoughts out of my mind. Too many what if’s plagued me. What if we did this, and something terrible happened to the town? What if the monster attacked when the barrier came down?
“Don’t we need to make a plan for putting new wards back up? We can’t just leave the town open to attacks.” If this thing was whatever Barrett feared, then we were in trouble.
Cait scooped up the book. “Leave that to me. I’m going to spend the next few days studying these and then figure out a spell that will keep all the beings that wish to do us harm out . Barrett, do you think you can find whatever is out there, infecting the barrier?”